Meet the 2025 AARP Massachusetts Advisory Council

The AARP Massachusetts Advisory Council (AC) provides strategic direction for AARP at the state level. The volunteer board is led by State President D. JacQuie Cairo-Williams. Each member brings uniquely valuable skills and experience to AARP.

DEBORAH JACQUNETTA CAIRO-WILLIAMS
Deborah, better known as JacQuie, was born and raised in Boston. She is a longtime Community activist and has been recognized many times for her contributions. She has a Masters in Management Degree and a Certificate of Organizational Development from Cambridge College, Cambridge, MA., and also has a Global Career Development Facilitator Certificate. In addition, she is a Justice of the Peace and a Notary Public. She was formerly the Vice President of the Board of Directors of Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative and the Treasures for Dudley Neighbors, Inc., a land trust.
She has served as the President and First Vice President of the Urban League Guild and now serves as the Membership Chair.
Cairo Williams was also the Director of the Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP), serving people 55 and older with challenges to employment, excluding age. She received the Whitney Young Award from the National Urban League, Urban League of Eastern Massachusetts' Presidents Award for Outstanding Performance, and the Lee F. Jackson Award. Cairo Williams was honored and awarded for her work with the Vietnamese American Community Center and awarded by the Commonwealth of MA’s Workforce Development Department for her achievements.
She was also an Assistant Vice President and Banking Center Manager at Bank of America, as well as a member of the region's Diversity Group.
The most important things that happened in her life was giving birth to her daughter, Charisse Monique, becoming a grandmother to, Dalisa Monique and a great grandmother to Trenai Charisse and Isaiah. The next thing that she felt had importance in her life was falling in love and the third thing was attaining her master’s degree. Cairo Williams believes in God and will tell you that none of the aforementioned would have been possible without Him.

MELODY BEACH
Melody Beach began her human resources career with Fenwal Safety Systems. In addition to FSS, Melody has worked for Rolls-Royce North America. She has provided human resources support to functions ranging from IT to business development as well as manufacturing personnel to administrative.
Melody earned her Bachelor of Science in Business Administration and Management at Newbury College and her Master of Science in Leadership & Human Resources Management from Northeastern University. Melody is professionally trained and certified through The Center for Application of Psychological Type (CAPT) as a Certified Practitioner of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, MBTI Step 1 and Step II.
Melody lives in central Massachusetts with her husband and three fur babies. She loves gardening, meditation and yoga. She spends much of her spare time riding her Harley Davidson on the country roads of CT and Western MA or hiking and camping in the Berkshires with her husband.

KATHLEEN BETTS
Kathleen Betts is a lifelong resident of the Boston area and completed her undergraduate degree at Boston College and Masters in Public Health at Boston University. Her career path took her to both the public and private sectors in a variety of leadership positions. In 2015, Kathy retired from her role as Assistant Secretary for Children Youth and Families in the Massachusetts Executive Office of Health and Human Services. She continued working in the field of public health by consulting for various agencies, and most recently served as Chief Community Officer, Director of Community Health for Cambridge Health Alliance. 

CHUCK MCKENZIE
Charles (“Chuck”) McKenzie spent more than 40 years in the financial services industry in the US and abroad, serving in client-facing, marketing, asset management and executive management roles for a variety of firms, including investment consulting firms, mutual fund companies, asset management firms, trust companies, banks and insurance companies.  Chuck’s career took him and his wife to London, England and Tokyo, Japan for 5 years, before they returned to Massachusetts in mid-2019. 
Now a resident of Cotuit on Cape Cod, Chuck is a senior advisor to an investment management start-up firm, he serves on the Town of Barnstable’s Comprehensive Financial Advisory Committee, he is a volunteer tax preparer for the AARP Tax-Aide Foundation on the upper Cape, and he is an officer of the Cotuit Highlands Association.
In his spare time, Chuck enjoys golf, travel, kayaking, modern art, reading (fiction and non-fiction) and writing.
Chuck has a BA from Bates College, an MBA from the University of Chicago, and has attained a number of professional designations, including CFA (Chartered Financial Analyst), CFP (Certified Financial Planner), FLMI (Fellow of the Life Management Institute), and CEBS (Certified Employee Benefit Specialist), and he is a Level 3 Golf Instructor certified by the USGTF.

ELLIE MEYER
Ellie Meyer is an occupational therapist with more than 30 years of clinical experience. She has been working for Paragon Rehabilitation as a program director and clinician since 2013 at locations in Cambridge, Brighton and Natick. She is a Certified Aging in Place Specialist with the National Association of Home Builders and has an Executive Certificate in Home Modifications from the University of Southern California. Ellie is a founding member of Home Modification Occupational Therapy Alliance (HMOTA) which seeks to promote the role of occupational therapy in home modifications, and she is completing 12 years as the Public Relations Representative for the Massachusetts Association of Occupational Therapy (MAOT). She has offered her skills in home assessment to both Rebuild Together Boston as well as the Boston Survivors Accessibility Alliance which served the victims of the Boston Marathon Bombing.
Since 2014 Ellie has been instrumental in organizing volunteer recruitment and training for the AARP HomeFit program in Massachusetts. As a doctoral student at Boston University, she is working to develop a supplemental curriculum of study for entry-level occupational therapy students which will prominently feature HomeFit. It is her hope that this will result in an increase in the number of occupational therapy professionals volunteering to be HomeFit presenters, not only in Massachusetts, but across the country where the curriculum is adopted.

JORGE QUIROGA
Award-winning journalist Jorge Quiroga recently retired after a 45-year tenure at WCVB Channel 5. As a general assignment reporter, Quiroga covered every major national and local story of importance to New Englanders including the Blizzard of '78, the September 11 attack on America, Sandy Hook school shootings, and the Boston Marathon Bombings. Jorge joined WCVB in 1974 as the first producer/host of Aquí, a Hispanic public affairs program he created.
Throughout his career, he received many prestigious broadcasting awards and honors, most recently, election to the Massachusetts Broadcasters Hall of Fame (2021), a Silver Circle Award from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (2018) and a Lifetime Achievement Award (2015) from El Mundo Newspaper. In conjunction with this honor, Mayor Marty Walsh proclaimed October 9, 2015 to be "Jorge Quiroga Day" in recognition of his distinguished career and service to viewers in the city of Boston.
Quiroga was appointed by the Governor of Massachusetts to the Special Commission to Study Journalism in Underserved Communities (2021).
Earlier in his career, Jorge was awarded a Goldsmith Fellowship at Harvard University's Shorenstein Center for Press, Politics and Public Policy. His public policy analysis, "Hispanic Voices: Is the Press Listening," was published by the center and the Harvard Journal of Hispanic Policy.
Jorge was born in Bogotá, Colombia. He received a M.Ed. from Harvard University in 1974 and graduated from Emerson College in 1972 with a B.A